My camp is Harry Potter themed. Harry Potter, as most of you know, is very important to me. The books and the movies have been a part of growing up. I'm not the only one who feels this way about these magical coming of age stories about love and friendship and figuring it all out against all odds. Last week the final installment of the series was released in cinemas. It was much anticipated and did not disappoint. I know the exact moment I started to cry. It was when Professor McGonagall started the protection charms around Hogwarts castle. Then I cried through the rest of the film. I've heard people describe the end of the films being like the end of the Harry Potter generations' childhood. I'm not sure if that is exactly how I feel, but I do feel overwhelming emotion as something really big in my life comes to an end. Anyway, enough of me gushing about HP!! I chose to do my camp on this for a few reasons: it is something that I love and know a lot about, it is something that children enjoy, there are lots of fun camp related activities, it is time appropriate with the new movie out, and if I could get one kid stoked on Harry Potter that wasn't before that would make me very happy.
So, today "Hogwarts" started at Kyeongsan Chodeung Hak-kyo (Kyeongsan Elementary School). We learnt some crucial vocabulary including "wizard", "witch", "wand" and "magic", we played some games to get to know each other a bit better, and then I put self portraits that they all drew into a hat and sorted them into 4 groups. They then went to work making posters for their groups and choosing a name, colour and animal for the team. They aren't all done yet, so I can't say what they all are yet, but one group is called "Family Bear" and their animal is, you guessed it, a bear, and their colour is brown (because that is what colour a bear is).
Happy summer!!! I hope that I don't melt in the heat on the way home.
